


But Before Tomorrow

by Kate_Reid



Series: Things They'll Never See [1]
Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Sequel Trilogy
Genre: Gen
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-08-29
Updated: 2017-04-10
Packaged: 2018-08-11 21:11:52
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 5
Words: 1,923
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7907791
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Kate_Reid/pseuds/Kate_Reid
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Moments in the space between Ben Solo and Kylo Ren.  This is a small series of vignettes.</p>
<p>Now with a moodboard by the fantastic Lyssa!</p>
<p> </p>
<p>  <img/></p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

As he walks onto the bridge, Kylo Ren resists the urge to shove his saber through the holoscreen. Instead, with a flick of the Force, he cuts off the screen’s power.

He had already voluntarily absented himself from the stormtrooper formation and General Hux’s concurrent red-faced rantfest, so he sees no reason to watch it on the screen. He stalks over to the viewport, ignoring the trepidation he feels rolling off the small crew in waves. He was used to their fear of his mask.

The scanner officer whispers, “It’s fired.”

But he knows, seconds before the whisper. Within the Force, he feels the awe of the troopers who bear witness to the weapon’s firing, the feeling of their pride and wonder magnified by their sheer numbers.

The terrible red beauty of the blast fills the viewport before him. The fiery plume separates into strands, splitting space with arcs of a light so bright that Ren winces a little, even through the polarized transparisteel of the viewport and the tint of his visor.

Ren is nearly brought to his knees by what follows. If the troopers’ emotions were a ripple . . . this, this is a deluge, bursting dams and overcoming bridges. He sees the deadly crimson ribbons scythe through the night again and again, this time coming toward him, from thousands of perspectives. Terror and dread, confusion and horror reach a sudden crescendo in his mind. And then, just as abruptly, there’s nothing.

Ren turns and stalks off the bridge.


	2. Chapter 2

He drops out of hyperspace at the coordinates he’d furtively researched.

He doesn’t know what he expected--no, that’s a lie. He does. He’d pulled up three-dimensional holos of the asteroid field, examined it from all angles. Now, taking manual control of the sublight engines, he steers his ship into the field and is surprised when he’s hailed. Startled, he flips comm switches.

A canned, aristocratic voice fills the cockpit, its accent reminiscent of the smooth tones he’d heard in recordings of his adoptive grandfather.

_"Welcome to Alderaan. The asteroid field around you is a cemetery and a monument to the spirit and beauty of our home and our people. Please be respectful._

_A special welcome to Alderaanians making their Return. Your home will live forever in your hearts, and in the hearts of those with whom you choose to share your memories. As long as those memories live, Alderaan is intact and thriving, and she shall never perish."_

The recording goes on to suggest that visitors open other comm channels--one to hear a history of Alderaan, one to hear traditional music, one to hear recordings left by Returners.

He knows the history, knows of the palm-sized holopad that sits on each of his mother’s desks, silently projecting a planet in miniature--a small, green-and-blue ball rotating serenely, whole and perfect.

He opens the music channel and his breath catches in his throat when he recognizes an instrumental version of "Mirror Bright," a song he remembers his mother singing softly to him as she tucked him into bed.

When his mother spoke of her childhood and adoptive parents, her face and voice grew soft and sad. Sometimes, a memory would make her laugh or smile, and she always looked a little surprised when the mirth came. He remembered being grateful that it wasn’t just him who could feel so many different, conflicting emotions at once.

When he was a little older, he found out that his mother had been forced to watch the destruction of her home after having been tortured for hours by Darth Vader. He was old enough to be appalled, but young enough to ask, wide-eyed, why his grandfather, the powerful Jedi Anakin Skywalker, hadn’t stopped Vader from harming her.

As she related the story to him, his mother had a different air about her than when she told tales of Grandpa Bail and Grandma Breha. When she spoke of Vader, she held herself straight and proud, the young princess and senator refusing to yield.

But when he’d asked his question, her demeanor slipped. She kissed him on the forehead and exited the room, but not before he saw the tears in her eyes. He could tell that she was trying very hard not to run. 

He’d asked his father about it later, and found himself embraced by his Wookiee uncle and softly patted by Han, who murmured, “He should have, kid. He damn well should have.”


	3. Chapter 3

All five of Kylo Ren’s senses are assaulted--the ground beneath him is so cold it burns; sirens wail as the base’s systems fail as the planet crumbles; the stench of his own burnt flesh fills his nose; his eyes see only snow and fire; he tastes blood in his mouth.

He tries to get to his feet but is knocked down again by a particularly violent quake.  Instead of making another attempt, he stays down.  Maybe this is his fate and the Force is ready to take him.  A spot in the back of his mind sparks to life with a familiar sting. . .

_ “YOU’VE FAILED, REN!” _

He closes his eyes and goes limp.  Force damn it, he  _ knows _ .  Futility stains his face, failure flows from him, fouling the snow.  He relaxes his body, settling back into his uselessness.  The klaxons and earthquakes recede as his mind clears.  He feels himself fade, but not to the familiar fuzz of injury-induced unconsciousness.

A voice calls his name, but not his chosen name--no, a dead hero’s name that never rested comfortably upon his shoulders, even as broad as they’ve become.  He recognizes the name, and he recognizes the voice, but the shock of the combination would have laid him flat if he wasn’t already.

The stentorian tones speaking his name belong to Darth Vader.  He recognizes the mechanized breathing from recordings he’s practically memorized.

“Ben . . . my grandson.”

Why won’t Vader call him by his name?

“Because you are Ben Skywalker Organa Solo and I am Anakin Skywalker.  We are neither of the names we took on to commit our crimes.  You begged me to show you the power of the darkness--did you never wonder why I didn’t answer?”

“But you sent visions--”

“I sent you no visions, boy!  I sent you  _ dreams _ !  I couldn’t reach you while you were awake.  While you were awake, Snoke held your mind in his shriveled fist, keeping you fearful and angry, pressing so hard on your deepest doubts--it was too hard for me to fight it from this side of the Force.”

Ren’s mind flashed through his dreams--his grandfather, young and handsome, dining with his grandmother, who’d never had a chance to age past her beauty, looking at him with concern and telling him to stay in the light.

Ren shook his head to clear it, light as it was from blood loss, injury, pain, and fatigue.  This wasn’t real.  The dreams that he forsook sleep to avoid, they were a trick of the Force, as was his current predicament, half-frozen by snow, half-burnt by his wounds.  But he was falling out of the snow . . . how could that be?  

However it was, he fell (up?) from the snow.  Helpless, he closed his eyes and resigned himself to what was happening to him.


	4. Chapter 4

He is being held and rocked gently back and forth. His mother’s voice trickles into his ears. _“Mirror bright . . .”_

No. He doesn’t want this. He reaches for the Force, but his control is muted, as if he wears mitts over his hands, a muffling cloak over his ability.

Against his will, his mind fills with memories that were never his, flashes through possibilities, probabilities, fleeting fragile senses of what hasn’t been and what will never be. 

He is kneeling before his uncle, who cuts off the long braid that drapes over his shoulder. He is a Jedi Knight.

He is kneeling again, before his tiny mother, as she sets a brilliant silver circlet over his dark hair. He is the Crown Prince of Alderaan.

He is seated beside his father, co-piloting the Millennium Falcon. He is a galaxy-renowned pilot and mildly infamous smuggler.

He is sitting on a gilded throne, a red-headed Grand Moff abasing himself before the dais. He is Emperor of the Galaxy.

He is standing in the Galactic Senate, weighed down a little by his elaborate clothing. He is King of Naboo.

He is standing alone at the center of a circle of fallen bodies, breathless, ecstatic, exhilarated by the heat of battle. He is Kylo, Ren Victorious, Master of the Knights of Ren.

He is shuffling nervously at an exhibit, watching the people who drop casual judgment onto his work. He is an artist.

He is pacing before he addresses a crowd, wondering what he has to say to pilots, guerillas, and soldiers. He is General Leia Organa’s lieutenant in the Resistance.

He is flying an X-wing, sending up prayers to the Force for his squadron, strafing the First Order’s weaponized planet. He is the leader of Rogue Squadron III.

He is solemn and dressed in dark ceremonial robes as he lights the funeral pyre. He is Han Solo’s bereaved son.

He is again clad in black as he intones a eulogy over which he’s agonized for days, even though he’s not saying it over a pyre; his mother’s body simply disappeared. He is Leia Organa’s bereaved son.

He’s so anxious as he tries to explain himself to the scavenger woman he’d fought so hard; his blush gives the lie to the stern words he’d like to speak. He is a fumbling suitor, just a man, standing in front of the woman he wronged.

He is flailing, trying to fight off the visions, battling the Force in his mind and losing. He is Kylo Ren, Ben Solo, injured, unconscious, perhaps delirious.


	5. Chapter 5

Can the Force make mistakes? He’s never believed that it did. He is absolutely certain that he is where he should be, that Snoke’s guidance has led him right to this point.

And here? And now? He can’t lie to himself. He yearns a bit for a stable weapon, one that isn’t as flawed as the one he made. The crackling, spitting red beam of his blade is a reminder that his training isn’t complete; it’s a stain to warn him of his own limitations. But if he’s perfectly honest with himself? He wants a saber without his father’s body on it.

He must punish himself for that rogue thought. He pounds his bowcaster wound, gratified by the blood that drips into the snow. The pain is welcome, familiar, soothing, as he throws the scavenger into the tree. 

Surprisingly, the traitor comes at him like a berserker, wielding the blue blade that should have been his. He cuts down FN-2187, expending a bit more effort than he feels he should have to; his grandfather’s legacy flies several yards away as the deserter hits the ground.

It is his birthright that he has to duck away from as it flies by him, stirring the air in front of his nose. It’s his patrimony that smacks neatly into the hand of a surprised scavenger.

She catches him off-balance, but he has many excuses--his injuries, his blood loss, his patricide, the stunned realization that the Force has passed him over to set his inheritance in the hands of this ragged desert woman. He fights her desperately, but he can’t kill her, doesn’t even want to harm her, because she feels like someone who should be familiar as home to him.

**Author's Note:**

> Thank you to Noel Gallagher, Timothy Zahn, Simon and Garfunkel, Roger Waters, and my dear Lyssa.


End file.
